


you can't get enough

by piggy09



Category: How to Get Away with Murder
Genre: Character Study, Gen, Unreliable Narrator
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-15
Updated: 2015-03-15
Packaged: 2018-03-18 00:39:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,139
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3549569
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/piggy09/pseuds/piggy09
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>She’s good at it, now: being what people need her to be. Not what they want, not what they <i>think</i> they need, but what they actually need. Slut, drug dealer, murderer – it’s all just a different name for something other. Something besides <i>you</i>. She’s good at it, being something-besides-you. She’s <i>great</i>. Smears her eyeshadow in layers thick as bruises around her eyes, spits out her words and chews them back up until everyone looks over her, just another liar, just another drop-out. Nothing. Nothing.</p>
<p>It’s better this way. It’s better that no one sees anything in her. It’s better.</p>
<p> </p>
<p>(A character study of Rebecca Sutter.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	you can't get enough

**Author's Note:**

> [warnings: drug use, canon death, slut-shaming, abuse]
> 
> This is my first tiny baby step out of the Orphan Black fandom, so be gentle with me. ;)
> 
> The fic is canon-compliant through the finale, as far as I know. However, nothing actually _happens_ in it, so there are a few spoilers but no enormous ones. For, you know, _whatever_ happened in the finale. I don't know anything about that! What finale, ahahahaha.

Yeah, she was in love with Lila. So what?

Doesn’t change the story. No truth in a courtroom, right? That’s what Annalise says, over and over, pacing back and forth around her house like she isn’t balancing on her heels, like it wouldn’t take one _shove_ to push her over. Rebecca hates her, sometimes – hates that Annalise is makeup painted over a bruise, hates that Annalise would think that makes the two of them the same. Rebecca’s nobody’s mirror, nobody’s lost innocence. She’s just herself. Really not that difficult to figure out.

So: yeah, that makes it more tragic, holding your dead almost-maybe-impossible-girlfriend’s body in a water tank; treading water, holding your breath, and waiting to wake up. But then again it’s also sad enough that Lila was her best friend. Her _only_ friend. Isn’t that a story you could just eat up? Poor little drug dealer girl, poor little slut-whore-bitch all on her own just _waiting_ for the pretty pink sorority girl to lift her up into the sun.

At the end of the day, you’re just left with a corpse in a water tank. What’s the point?

* * *

Rebecca told Wes _everything_. Every truth and every lie she could think of. She’d never opened up that much to anyone – never closed her eyes and really pictured the hair color of her fake first boyfriend, never whispered _my mom_ into anyone’s ears. She wonders if Wes realizes how special he is. Rebecca’s never put that much effort into lying to anyone. Not ever.

No one’s ever tried to—

But that’s not the point.

She said some stuff she’s really proud of, too. Cried and everything. Rebecca sees every relationship as another long con, and this one’s going to make out big. She guesses in this metaphor the contents of the safe are Wes’ secrets, or his emotional vulnerability, or maybe his trust? Don’t think about that. Think about all the ways the world must have _broken_ Rebecca, left her lying with her head on Wes’ chest and listening to the way his heartbeat sounds like a combination lock turning and clicking. Think about sad, scared Rebecca, learning without meaning to that everyone is going to lie to you – everyone is going to leave you – everyone is going to lie or leave, eventually, so you might as well do it first.

That’s how Rebecca lives. A while ago she watched a documentary about lizards – documentaries are her favorite kinds of movies, don’t judge – and there was a scene about this one kind of lizard that drops its tail when a predator’s coming after it. The thing with the most teeth sees the tail, big juicy piece of meat, and snaps it up instead. Lizard goes free. Yeah, that’s what Rebecca does. But, see, the fact that she does that? That’s a tail too. You drop it behind you, that you drop things, and everyone eats it up. And you go free.

Does that make sense?

Does it matter?

She’s good at it, now: being what people need her to be. Not what they want, not what they _think_ they need, but what they actually need. Slut, drug dealer, murderer – it’s all just a different name for something other. Something besides _you_. She’s good at it, being something-besides-you. She’s _great_. Smears her eyeshadow in layers thick as bruises around her eyes, spits out her words and chews them back up until everyone looks over here, just another liar, just another drop-out. Nothing. Nothing.

It’s better this way. It’s better that no one sees anything in her. It’s better.

Which is why Wes is so frightening: he needs something to protect, something to save, and he’s looking at her like she’s something she’s _not_ , which is beautiful. Yeah, Rebecca’s used to people seeing her as something she isn’t, but usually they go _down_ and not _up_. No one’s tried to make her their fucking Virgin Mary, okay, she’s not used to it. Being a pet project? Yes. Having someone literally kill a man to save your life? _No_.

It’s scary. Rebecca’s so afraid, of this, of Wes spilling out his secrets in the dark like they have no meaning. Like it’s _easy_.

She’s so afraid, and all she can do is open her eyes as wide as she can, listen as hard as she can, and memorize every single fucking one so that someday – when Wes realizes what she is, when Wes turns on her – she can use them against him and they will finally _mean_ something.

* * *

Rebecca’s first kiss is with Lila.

…No, that one’s not believable. Start over.

* * *

Rebecca’s first kiss is with a boy who has a huge crush on her, in a movie theatre; his hand’s all sweaty, when he holds hers, and his mouth is salty and greasy from the popcorn. He’s a really bad kisser.

Rebecca’s first kiss is with a girl, at a party. She is drunk, and everything is spinning, and the other girl’s mouth tastes like cherry chapstick – cliche, right – and vodka. Rebecca kind of _loved_ her.

Rebecca’s first kiss is with a boy who pays her. Rebecca loses her virginity to a boy who pays her. Rebecca sells drugs to a boy who pays her. Rebecca sells her soul, piece by piece, to boys with fistfuls of money in their disgusting, sweaty palms.

Rebecca’s first kiss is a boy she thought she loved.

Rebecca’s first kiss is—

* * *

Rebecca has never been drunk. You’d think she would – perk of the job and all – but the thought of drinking so much that she forgets herself just freaks her out. She doesn’t like the way the liquid slithers down your throat. Like drowning. Doesn’t like the idea of saying things she won’t remember later. Doesn’t like the idea of crying and reaching for someone. You can’t do that. That’s not something you can _do_.

Her boyfriend hit her. Does it matter which one? Maybe all of them hit her. Maybe Rebecca just comes crawling back, over and over, because she doesn’t know what else she deserves. Maybe she’s spent so long pretending to be worthless that she doesn’t remember how not to be.

Maybe she’s forgotten who she _is_ , under all the eye makeup and piercings. Then again, maybe the person under there wasn’t worth shit to begin with. At least this way she gets what she wants. Sometimes.

But yeah, she got hit. Doesn’t _matter_ , okay? She’s moved past it, it’s fine. She learned, though. Even the nice boys turn into something else when you’re underneath them. Everyone sheds their skin when they’re met with something that’s less-than-them, becomes who they were all along.

_Everyone_ is a monster. You can’t get drunk, you can’t fuck around with strong drugs. Turn your back for a second and _boom_. Knife.

I mean, look at Lila. Is that a classic betrayal, or what?

* * *

All of Annalise’s little puppy dogs think they know all there is to know about betrayal. As if. Rebecca knows about betrayal: _You were just a way to escape my stupid life for a little while_. Rebecca knows about betrayal, because Lila screamed she hated Rebecca and Rebecca slept with Lila’s boyfriend and Lila died. Lila _died_.

But no, they know everything about the world, all these law school idiots. They walk around with knives out and screech, _Look, I’m a backstabber!_

Dumb shits.

They leak secrets like stab wounds dripping blood, and hey: if Rebecca doesn’t take ‘em, someone else probably will. Asher is a desperate puppy dog, who just wants to be loved and wants to be fucked. In that order. Connor sneers and preens and goes really fucking pale if you mention his _boyfriend_. Michaela’s a bundle of loose ends, all the ambition Rebecca shed years ago. Michaela carries it around like a tail she doesn’t know how to lose. Laurel is all nervous glances and peace-keeping; she’s a sucker for the happy ending, _wants_ to believe in Rebecca.

So does Wes.

They’re all so willing to throw themselves at their monster of the week, so desperate to be in the right. They turn on Rebecca until they don’t. They turn on Sam until they can’t. They turn on each other, over and over again, until their _mommy_ steps in and fixes things for them.

When she does, Annalise looks at Rebecca, like she’s expecting something from Rebecca. Like she wants Rebecca to smirk, and say _well-done_.

Fuck that. Fuck Annalise Keating, fuck her for thinking that Rebecca is _just like her_. Fuck Annalise Keating for swooping in to save Rebecca, just like people keep doing – no one can resist her, right, poor unfortunate soul.

Disney movies are her favorite kinds of movies. Don’t judge.

Rebecca wants to tear out Annalise’s throat with her teeth, and the worst part is she doesn’t know why. That’s so fucking dangerous. Annalise and Wes are both dangerous, because she feels so strongly about them and she isn’t doing it on purpose. She never meant to. She didn’t.

(So say she was in love with Lila. Say it broke her heart a little bit – a lot, that’s better, a _lot_ – to see Lila swooning over her Mister _Darcy_ , say she was stupid enough to bare her stupid, worthless heart to Lila with her perfect curls of hair and smile like – like – like a _sunrise_.

It doesn’t matter. She could say she slept with Lila’s boyfriend to prove a point, or she could say she slept with him because he was the closest she could get, or she could say she slept with him because she wanted Lila to look at Rebecca and think _sex_ – that Rebecca was so out of her mind with love or lust or anger that she got dizzyingly angry and wanted to break Lila’s toys. Rebecca could say _anything_ , and it wouldn’t make her any more or less guilty.

If saying that she fell asleep thinking about Lila’s lips would get her out of jail, Rebecca would have done it. It would have been perfect: the quivering lip, the darting eyes, _I’d never felt that way about anyone, I – I didn’t know what to_ do _, I wasn’t doing it on purpose, I never meant to, I loved her so much it was eating me alive_. Give a wounded glare to Lila’s boyfriend. Let the hurt rise to the surface of her eyes, so everyone could see. Give them a real fucking _show_. Then the killing blow (ha): _I never could have done it. I_ loved _her._

Sure, she thought about it. Wouldn’t have worked, though. She could see that, and she wasn’t even in law school. Look at that.)

She sits in Annalise’s house, watching everyone move. Michaela’s having a hissed phone conversation with her fiance – ooh, _ex-_ fiance – and Laurel and Frank aren’t looking at each other again. Or: Bonnie’s hair is mussed, she woke up late, she’s going to be tired and cranky and easy to push and no one will notice and today will be a day when everyone yells. Or: Annalise drank a whole bottle of vodka last night – it’s under the sink, god, does no one _notice_ anything – and she has a headache.

Rebecca could teach Annalise a thing or two about that. She’s worked off some hangovers from _hell_.

So, Rebecca sits and watches. Watches everyone watch her. And yes, she is filing away everything she could possibly use to break these people, when she has to (she _has_ to), but she is also trying to work it out: why does being here make her skin scream? Could she have been Annalise if she’d burned her life to the ground and started over instead of just living in the wreckage? Could she have _never_ been Annalise? Does she hate Annalise because they’re too similar, or not close enough? Does she hate Annalise because Annalise believes in her, or because she doesn’t?

She doesn’t need that kind of soul-searching or whatever when Lila is dead and she’s going to go to jail for it. She just keeps breathing and saves what she needs. Drops the rest and goes.

* * *

Rebecca grew up in a shitty apartment in a shitty side of town. Really, she was _destined_ for this bullshit. What else was she gonna do? Become a gross Lifetime movie (okay, she watches them a lot, they make her cry every time, they’re her favorite kinds of movies, don’t judge) and become inspired by her brave white teacher and win a bunch of scholarships and end up at a private law school, just the same as all these losers? Nah. Rebecca gets money. She makes a living. She doesn’t look back.

* * *

Rebecca grew up on the streets, knew being hungry from the time she was born. Hunger like a fist clenched in her stomach. Now she eats secrets and swallows them down, tells herself they’re enough; now she eats whole cartons of ice cream – mint chocolate chip’s her favorite flavor, though she told Wes it was chocolate – until she gets sick. Just because she can. She knows better than to make any place a home, any person; there is no home to go to, only running and running until you fall down.

* * *

Rebecca grew up in a string of foster homes, and she remade herself each time she walked through another door. She knew they weren’t going to keep her. No one wants the girl with the big eyes who notices too much, talks too fast. Once she stopped being cute and started being surly that was it, she was off the market. She learned a lot, from fists and dicks and words – slurred words, screamed words, words whispered in the dark that she wasn’t supposed to hear. She’s what she’s been made. Whoop-di-doo. So is everyone else.

* * *

Rebecca grew up rich and ran away from home, sick of straight hair and straight skirts and sick of being straight. She knows people think it, when they see her: that she’s the poster girl for teen rebellion gone too far, one phone call away from having Daddy bring her home and wash the makeup from her eyes with bottled water that costs, like, $200 a bottle. Whatever. They don’t get it – that’s not who she was, this is. She likes this better: lying and cheating and scraping by.

It’s more honest.

* * *

Rebecca tells Lila she loves her when Lila is asleep, because Rebecca doesn’t ever want her to know. Love is stupid. Love is dangerous. Love is watching another straight girl torn between two guys; love is never telling her that you’re bi at all, because you don’t want her to look at you like _that_. Love is eating away at the inside of Rebecca and driving her mad, frantic and mad.

So. Lila’s dozing off on the roof of her sorority house, phone cradled in her hands. She’s on her back and she looks so peaceful – looks like Ophelia (Rebecca has definitely read _Hamlet_ ) (no, she saw it performed) (no, she was in a production) (no, she had a girlfriend who worked on the stage) (no one would believe she knows about the play) (start over), looks lovely like a corpse. Rebecca wants to change for Lila, rip out her ear piercings and give up her life of crime. Rebecca wants to ignore Lila’s calls and never talk to her again. Rebecca wants to run away. Instead she whispers: _I love you_ , words as soft and sweet and pretty as Lila’s lip gloss. Words as violent as choking to death.

She thinks, once she’s said it, that it’s going to be easier. The words are out. Even if Lila doesn’t know, they’re out of her.

It makes it easier.

Also: it doesn’t.

She never tells Wes she loves him, because the last time she told someone she loved them they ended up on Missing posters; the last time she told someone she loved them everyone screamed _murderer_. What is love, anyways, but a slow kind of murder? Not worth it. He buys her pizza and she holds him through the nightmares and he smiles at her like she is something worthy of him, or maybe salvation. Sometimes she smiles back. But she never tells him.

She doesn’t regret not telling him. She never regrets it, not even at the very end. No regret. None.

* * *

She confesses to murder. This is the truth.

She writes it down, every gory detail. Remembers her hands around Lila’s throat, the way Lila had gasped, the perfect “o” of her pretty pink mouth. Rebecca loved Lila. Rebecca killed Lila. Rebecca carried Lila’s body all the way up the ladder and threw it in the water tank. Rebecca hated Lila. Rebecca killed Lila. Rebecca was jealous of Lila. Rebecca killed Lila. Rebecca loved Lila. Rebecca killed Lila.

What do they need from her? What do they need her to be?

She says: Griffin was on top of her, choking her to death. This is the truth.

She remembers it, every gory detail. Remembers Griffin’s hands around Lila’s throat, the way Lila had gasped, the perfect “o” of her pretty pink mouth. Rebecca loved Lila. Rebecca could never have killed her. Griffin played football, had muscles like a fucking tank and she couldn’t budge him. Rebecca had to watch Lila die, right in front of her, and Griffin – and Griffin –

She didn’t do it. This is the truth.

She doesn’t know the details, because she wasn’t there.

Oh, that is a lie. That is a lie. That is a _lie_. She knows the details: the strands of Lila’s hair floating in the water, the way the inside of the water tank smelled like Lila’s perfume. She came home dripping water – if anyone knows the _fucking_ details, it’s her. Who else would know? Who else has the memory of Lila’s dead eyes waking them up with a scream on the tip of their tongue?

The truth. What is the truth? The truth is that there is no truth. There is only the story, and the story changes over and over. The story is Rebecca, and Rebecca changes over and over. Trashy townie slut, piece of shit whore, a cunt, a pair of eyes, a plastic baggie filled with drugs, someone you can save.

The truth is this: Rebecca can save herself.

The truth is this: Rebecca is past the point of saving.

The truth is this: Rebecca doesn’t need to be saved, because the whole idea of “saving” is stupid.

The truth is this: there is no truth, there never has been. There is only the story, and whoever can tell it right – and Rebecca’s the best storyteller there is. She knows what people want. She knows what people need, and people never need the truth.

There is no truth. There is only this: lying.

**Author's Note:**

> I can sell you lies  
> You can't get enough  
> Make a true believer of  
> Anyone anyone anyone  
> I can call you up if I feel alone  
> I can feed your dirty mind  
> Like I know I know what you are  
> \--"Lies," CHVRCHES
> 
> Thank you for reading! Please leave kudos + comments if you liked!


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